“The Whites of Their Eyes”

Posted on October 29, 2014 by Mark McMillion

There used to be an old saying, “Don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes!” The idea was that you don’t shoot your gun till the target is close enough that you can actually see what you’re shooting at. Maybe that was what was said by military commanders 200 years ago or so.

And that principle could certainly apply to modern pronouncements on Bible prophecy. I’m appalled at times by how many people are convinced without a doubt that… (take your pick) …Obama is the Antichrist? The Pope… no, wait; Islam is the seedbed and fountain head of all evil, the primordial force of Satan in the last days? And on it goes.

“They” are out to get us. Five years ago in Houston I was in a gathering of sober and sincere Christians and we were told that the roads out of Houston would be blockaded within 6 months… 6 months I tell you!… and everyone would be corralled in FEMA camps. A very serious Christian brother was telling this to us. That was in 2009. And on it goes.

As a person who utterly believes in the coming of the Lord and that we’re very likely living in the endtime, it interests me and also saddens me that there are so very many “Wolf, Wolf” calls coming from so many Christians at this time.

The Apostle Paul said, “Judge nothing before its time…” (I Corinthians 4:5) But this admonition is rejected or forgotten by so many Christians today as they jump on their soap box or band wagon to shout the latest “warning” which ends up being another false pronouncement and false dawn of troubles to come.

Invariable there is no accountability for the false proclaimer of immediate doom. But without hesitation or twinge of conscience they’ll re-proclaim their next declaration of imminent doom for a date another 6 months away. And virtually no one calls them on it or takes note of these ones who constantly proclaim imminent woe and it doesn’t come to pass as they’ve told us it would.

And yet I don’t disagree with much of what they are saying; just the continual over-specific-ness of their declaration, plus the fact that so often they just end up plain wrong. That’s the problem.

Very many see and realize that we live in dire times. But the common thing to do for many Christian commentators is to personally declare that some very short and specific length of time will expire before “the very end” is upon us. Actually I did a 7 minute video on this subject, called “Famous Failures of Prophetic Interpretation”, the link to that is here.

Like the guy said, “Don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes”. Jesus actually gave us some very specific things to look forward to, in the gospels, concerning the times leading up to His return. In my video series on the book of Daniel I have gone over some of those specific points, such as the appearance of “the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place”. (Matthew 24:15) This was the sign Jesus said to watch for which would mark the beginning of the “great tribulation” (Matthew 24:21) which is said to be in a surprising number of places a length of time of 3½ years. Jesus said, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days” (Matthew 24:29) is when He would return to gather His elect, His people.

If this is something you are interested in, perhaps you’d like to see the 40 minute video I did on the specifics and details of “the last 7 years” before the return of Jesus, as it is outlined in Daniel 9 and by the Lord Himself in Matthew 24. Here’s the link to that video on YouTube.

I utterly believe that the Bible gives us numerous things on the subject of the endtime that are solid, bedrock doctrines that completely hold up to scrutiny. But present Christian dialog among believers on the coming of the Lord is cluttered, strewn and clogged with false declarations and false declarers. It seems the gullibility of His sheep is successfully taken advantage of over and over again.

Does it matter? Can’t we just go on enjoying the latest shout of woe, regardless of whether it is founded in God’s truth and actual reality? Jesus said “It would be better that a millstone be hung about your neck and that you be drowned in the sea than that you offend one of these little ones” (Matthew 18:6), one of His searching sheep, longing for the truth and looking to what they can find in Christianity to see if the truth is there. How many are stumbled and turned away by the sensationalists with their latest announcement when they see that their prophecy of imminence fell through and they were just another empty vessel?

God help us to have a higher standard. Jesus said He was the truth. (John 14:6) The Holy Spirit is “the spirit of truth” (John 16:13). So many who are involved with teaching prophecy would do well to heed the warning of centuries ago when it comes to foretelling the future.

“Don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes”. Don’t keep proclaiming things that must imminently occur when you really don’t know that for certain in Him. If you have a record of yelling “Wolf, Wolf” to the extent that you stumble the weak and are a pitiful testimony of the Lord’s Word and truth, please stop for your own sake, for the sake of His sheep and for the witness of Christ that is besmirched.

Text to “The Last 7 Years” video

Posted on October 6, 2014 by Mark McMillion

**[This is the text to the video “Daniel 9:27—The Last 7 Years”. To view this video, click here. Also, this blog post is longer than normal.]**

Hi again, I’m Mark. This video is going to be different from the ones I’ve done before. Up till now, the videos have mostly been about prophecies that have been fulfilled. This one will be about prophecies yet to be fulfilled. Also, we’ll mainly be focusing on just one verse, the last verse in Daniel chapter 9.

You might wonder why a whole video would be centered around one verse. Well, we’re first going to have a short review of what we’ve seen already in Daniel chapter 9. That way, we’ll see how much prophecy is still to be fulfilled in this last verse in the chapter. At the beginning of the chapter, we found Daniel reading the prophecies of Jeremiah which predicted a 70 year captivity for the Jewish people who’d been carried away to Babylon. Daniel had read in Jeremiah 29:10, “For thus says the LORD, After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform my good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place.”

And then we read that Daniel was moved to pray a very heartfelt prayer to God, for the Lord to forgive the Jews and for Him to fulfill His Word. While praying, Daniel had a visitation from the angel Gabriel who touched Daniel and then began to give him one of the most significant prophecies in the Bible. Gabriel told Daniel, “Seventy weeks are determined upon your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sins, to make reconciliation for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up the vision and prophecy and to anoint the Most Holy.” (Daniel 9:24)

Gabriel told Daniel of a mysterious “70 weeks” “to make an end of sins”, “to bring in everlasting righteousness”. In our last class, we saw how that this “70 weeks” spoken of here is not what we would think of in our times. The meaning “seventy weeks” was “70 sevens of years”. And we saw this “70 weeks” was speaking about a period of 490 years.

I’m going over this somewhat quickly and you may want to review the class that was done before this if you have questions here. After Gabriel told Daniel about the 70 weeks, he broke this down and spoke of a period of “69 weeks”, 483 prophetic years. This was to be the period of time between “the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem” and “Messiah the prince.”

The commandment to restore Jerusalem was given by Artaxerxes in 444 BC and Jesus of Nazareth was crucified in 33 AD. We saw in our class that the length of time between these two periods, “the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem” and “Messiah the Prince”, amounted to “69 weeks”, 483 prophetic years, just as Gabriel had said would happen. [For an explanation of “prophetic years”, go to the text of the previous class on Daniel, about “The 69 Weeks” which can be read here.]

Going further, the prophecy said that “after” “Messiah shall be cut off”, Jerusalem and the temple would be destroyed again. This happened in 70 AD. But we still haven’t come to the conclusion of this prophecy. The 69 weeks of this prophecy were fulfilled at the crucifixion of Jesus. But Gabriel’s prophecy of 70 weeks, 490 years, to bring in everlasting righteousness hasn’t happened yet. There’s still one “week” left. One last 7 year period is yet to be fulfilled in this prophecy in order to bring in God’s Kingdom on earth.

And that brings us to Daniel 9:27. But this is such a key verse; it’s fundamental to most of the prophetic verses in the Bible which are still not yet fulfilled. So I think at this point we should take a brief review of the chapters we’ve studied up till now. Because, in each of those chapters, we found things that are not yet fulfilled. And each one of those parts is an integral component, a piece of the picture that Daniel 9:27 is going to help us put together.

In Daniel chapter 2, we found Daniel as a young teenage who’d been carried away to Babylon. King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon had dreamed a dream that he couldn’t remember. In his fury the king commanded to kill all the wise men of Babylon and Daniel was in training to be one of those. After he prayed desperately, God revealed the secret of the king’s dream to Daniel.

So Daniel went before the king to tell him his dream. The king had seen a statue with a head of gold, arms of silver, a belly of brass, legs of iron and feet of iron and clay. Then in his dream the king saw a stone which hit the statue on its feet so that the whole statue crumbled to dust and was blown away. And the stone became a great mountain that filled the earth. Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar that the head of gold was his kingdom of Babylon. After him would come another kingdom, then a third and then a fourth. We now know from history that those coming kingdoms represented Medo-Persia, Greece and Rome.

But here’s the part that’s really for us in this class. What did that strange stone represent when it hit the statue, causing it to crumble to dust, and then the stone became a great mountain that filled the earth? What was that? Here is Daniel’s explanation of this to Nebuchadnezzar. “And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed. And the kingdom shall not be left to other people but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.” (Daniel 2:44)

The 4 beasts of Daniel 7

Those kingdoms that Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream have come and gone. But that final kingdom, the coming kingdom of God on earth has not yet happened. Then, many years later Daniel himself had a similar vision, but different. In Daniel’s vision in chapter 7 he saw 4 beasts rising out of the sea: a lion, a bear, a 4 headed leopard and then a great and dreadful beast. These four represented the same 4 kingdoms, seen in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream decades earlier.

But we’ve found that each prophetic chapter builds on the revelations of the previous prophetic chapter and then also introduces important new elements of the future to come. In Daniel 7 we were first told of “the little horn”, the future endtime dictator that’s spoken of more clearly in Daniel 8 and then also in the book of Revelation. It says of this “little horn” (Daniel 7:8) …“he shall speak great words against the most high” and “shall wear out the saints of the most high.” And a length of time was given for this period. “They shall be given into his hand …for a time, times and half a time” (Daniel 7:25).

But Daniel 7 also, like chapter 2, had a happy ending. Verse 27 ended the angel’s explanation to Daniel when he said, “And the kingdom and dominion and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the most high, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. ”

[This blog post is longer than average ones. To continue reading this article, click on “Continue reading” below this text here.]

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“The Last 7 Years” -Daniel 9:27-

Posted on September 11, 2014 by Mark McMillion

If you’ve been seeing the other videos on the prophecies of Daniel before this, you’ll know that this is essentially the seminal video in the series. This video, based around the last verse in Daniel 9, is focused on the Old Testament verse that Jesus Himself referred to when He was asked about His return. For those familiar with Bible prophecy, this verse is somewhat like a linchpin, a “Rosetta Stone”, fitting together the many different pieces of the endtime picture and the future to come.

On a personal note, it’s been a joy to me that the Lord has made it so that I’ve been able to get this far in this series that these two videos on Daniel chapter 9 have been completed. I hope and pray this one will be a blessing to you and to all those who are seeking to understand. As Jesus said about this verse, “…whoever reads, let him understand” (Matthew 24:15b).

“The Last 7 Years” video update

Posted on July 31, 2014 by Mark McMillion

What am I working on nowadays? “The Last 7 Years” “The 70^th Week of Daniel”. Some of you know what this is and it possibly sends a slight shiver down your spine, as it does to me. Because you know that this subject, based around the last verse in chapter 9 of the book of Daniel, is really the crux, the linchpin, the keystone around which most of the unfulfilled prophecies in the Bible gather.

So this has really sharpened my focus as well as my desperation to try to make this next video to be equal to the subject matter, which is about as significant and compelling as is possible to be. Some of you know that. You know the controversy surrounding this subject and even this verse which the video will be centered around. But for those of you who don’t know what this is about, I’ll try to do a short explanation.

Daniel 9:27: the keystone of the books of Daniel and Revelation

If you saw the video I completed around 6 weeks ago, “The 69 Weeks“, you’ll know that an incredibly specific prophecy was given by the angel Gabriel to the prophet Daniel when he was probably into his 80’s. You can see the whole video here or read the text here. But what we found was that there was still the very end of this prophecy yet to be fulfilled. There was a 7 year period that had not yet happened which would complete the fullness of what Gabriel told Daniel would happen.

A couple of nights ago I was at a small Christian gathering and I met a man in his 40’s who I didn’t know. I ended up telling this new friend that it was folks like him who kept me going and inspired in what I am doing. In fact, I told him that sometimes I sort of, in my mind, multiply people like him by around 50 million. Because I think there’s easily 50 million people like him around the world who are looking for the truths of Bible prophecy.

He’s got a good job, married and most would consider him successful. But he knows something’s going on. He knows there are some really important things in the Bible that are predicted to happen someday and he really wonders if we are on the cusp of, or are already into, those times. But he can’t find very much in the way of substance when he tries to research and get to the bottom of what the prophets in the Bible said.

So it’s folks like him that keep me inspired. Because the Lord continues to lay it on my heart that there are so many, all over the world, who want the truth, particularly about prophecy and the future.

Daniel 9:27, and later verses in Daniel 11, are the place in Scripture where the Old Testament and the New Testament meet. Jesus referred to these verses when He was asked about His future return to earth in Matthew 24 and Mark 13. From these verses and the things that Jesus told us (and Paul after Him), we can go to Revelation chapter 13 and again find things that are mentioned in the prophecies of Daniel.

So I’m either going to give you all the details right now or I’m not. And I’m not right here because that’s what I’m working on right now, to try to find the very best way to present this material. I hope and am planning that this video I’m working on now will be out some time in September.

If you would, please do pray for me at this time. I don’t often ask for prayer but I do feel a need for this now. One of the most important stages in preparing a video like this is the scripting of the text. It can’t be just some stale, verbose narrative. The subject is so alive with meaning and consequence for our times that I feel a responsibility to somehow convey these truths in as clear a way as possible when writing the text. Your prayers for this are much appreciated.

Lord willing and Lord helping me, this video on “The Last 7 Years” should be out in the next 6 to 8 weeks. Thanks for the words of encouragement I’ve received from many of you. I’m looking forward to having this next video out soon.

Your friend in Him,

Mark

Daniel Chapter 9-a Video: “The 69 Weeks”

Posted on June 8, 2014 by Mark McMillion

This is the first of two videos on Daniel chapter 9. It focuses on the parts of the “70 Weeks” prophecy, revealed by the angel Gabriel, which have already been fulfilled, focusing mainly on verses 24 to 26. An incredibly specific 483 year length of time was revealed to Daniel that would pass between “the commandment to restore Jerusalem” and “Messiah the Prince” (Daniel 9:25). Adding to that, the angel Gabriel told Daniel that “after… Messiah shall be cut off”, the city of Jerusalem and the Jewish Temple would again be destroyed again (Daniel 9:26). This all came to pass precisely as this prophecy said it would, in the centuries to come.

It’s always seemed to me that the two most significant, important prophetic chapters in the Old Testament are Isaiah 53 and Daniel chapter 9. Chapters 2, 7 and 8 in Daniel lay the groundwork for and lead up to the truth revealed in Daniel 9. The rest of the book of Daniel builds upon the foundation made plain in chapter 9.

It would almost be difficult to overstate the importance of this chapter. Jesus of Nazareth, when asked by His disciples when He would return said, “When you see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the Holy place, whoever reads it, let him understand.” (Matthew 24:15) It’s in Daniel 9 and later chapters in Daniel that this reference to the mysterious “abomination of desolation” is found.

But this is not an easy chapter to understand. I’ve tried, therefore, to make this as simple as I could in order to reach people who’ve never before read or understood this chapter.

As I mention in the video, this chapter is another one in Daniel which is personal to me. Reading and understanding the remarkable truths in this chapter had a profound impact on my life, my view of reality and the world we live in. I hope this video will be a blessing to you and that you’ll be able to see and grasp the astounding truth that’s revealed in Daniel chapter 9.

Daniel chapter 9 video progress

Posted on April 20, 2014 by Mark McMillion

Thanks for your prayers, things are going well. Over the last month I’ve been able to work on the first of two videos on Daniel chapter 9. When talking about that chapter, it’s really hard to do the subject justice. Here are a few thoughts.

Daniel, reading the prophecies of Jeremiah. Daniel 9:2

There are perhaps two chapters which are the most significant and important prophetic chapters in the Old Testament: Isaiah 53 and Daniel chapter 9. Or so it’s always seemed to me. The chapters in Daniel that I’ve done videos on till now, chapters 2, 7 and 8, all lay the groundwork for and lead up to the truth revealed in Daniel chapter 9. The remaining chapters in Daniel 9, chapters 10, 11 and 12, all build upon the foundation of revelation made plain in Daniel 9.

But then, is it really right to say that things are “made plain” in Daniel chapter 9? What if you tried to get the main points of history for the next two or three thousand years compacted into three or four verses? That’s how Daniel 9 is. Actually, there are only four verses in the chapter that are prophetic. In the video I’m working on now, I’m focusing on the first three of those, verses 24 to 26.

The beasts of Daniel 8. No beasts in Daniel 9.

This chapter is somewhat advanced. And it is concentrated. There’s a tremendous amount of information conveyed in very few words. In Daniel 7 and 8 there were visualizations of beasts, representing nations or kingdoms. There aren’t any beasts in this chapter. The angel Gabriel is just giving the prophet Daniel the straight Word of God.

Many believers, of whatever denomination or even faith, know next to nothing about the truths revealed in this chapter. Personally, I believe that God has a foreknowledge of events in our world. God has a destiny foreordained for mankind and it’s going to be fulfilled. We individually have free choice and we’re responsible for our choices. But God has an overall design for mankind. Daniel chapter 9 is one of the clearest examples in the Bible of God’s foreknowledge and involvement in the ultimate destiny of mankind.

For those of you who don’t know anything about the chapter, here’s a brief synopsis. Around 539 BC, Daniel is reading the prophet Jeremiah and he comes to realize that Jeremiah’s prophecy of a 70 year captivity of the Jews is just about to be finished. Daniel then prays a long and desperate prayer for God to forgive His people and to act on their behalf.

At the end of this prayer, the angel Gabriel again appears to Daniel, as he had at other times. But Gabriel’s message was not about the 70 years prophecy of Jeremiah. God had something far greater and more important in mind, the salvation of all peoples and the bringing in of God’s Kingdom on earth.

Gabriel proceeded to tell Daniel of an exceedingly specific length of time between a future decree to rebuild Jerusalem and “Messiah the Prince” (Daniel 9:25), a period of 483 years. Gabriel went on to say that after “Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself” (Daniel 9:26), that the future temple and the rebuilt city of Jerusalem would again be destroyed. As is brought out in the video, Jesus of Nazareth was crucified around 33 AD.

Fall of Jerusalem, 70 AD

In 70 AD, the Roman legions of Titus surrounded Jerusalem and destroyed the city and the sanctuary. Israel was effectively ended and the Jews were scattered among all nations for nearly 1900 years.

I hardly know of another prophecy in the Bible that’s so all encompassing, so historically based and so profound in its evidence of God’s hand in the history of mankind. And yet, as I said above, it’s virtually unknown, even to most sincere and devout Christians. Perhaps it’s because this chapter is rather dense and compacted. There are numbers, dates and historical facts involved which can get to be a bit hard to chew and digest. That’s what I’m really working on right now, to try to make this as easy to understand as possible. I’m also including a good deal of visual aids in this video, as I have in others.

If things continue to go well, I’m hoping to have this video available to view by the end of May. Of course I can’t be absolutely sure about this but that’s my goal. It’s primarily focusing on verses 24 to 26; the ones that cover what’s called “the 69 weeks”, for those of you who already know a little about the chapter.

Then the next video after this will zoom in on just one verse, the last one in Daniel 9, verse 27. That verse is pretty much the crux and the keystone around which all future prophecy, still yet to be fulfilled, is based. I’m very focused and inspired to be working on these things right now. So, the end of May; that’s the date I’m shooting for to make this first Daniel 9 video available. Thanks for your prayers for this project, God bless you, Mark

Famous Failures of Prophetic Interpretation

Posted on January 11, 2014 by Mark McMillion

I have been able to complete another supplementary video to Daniel chapter 8. That chapter is a pretty controversial chapter in the history of prophecy and there have been many things published, as well as misunderstandings experienced, on this chapter. In the main video on Daniel chapter 8, I aimed to not bring in those various views as some of them have stumbled a lot of people or at least confused many. But in these supplementary videos, it’s seemed good to briefly touch on these things so that everyone can be aware that there are these questions and controversies.

This video has to do with times in history when someone has pointed out something they thought was just about to happen, because they felt Bible prophecy was just about to be fulfilled. That happened twice, rather famously, over 100 years ago as a direct result of misunderstanding something that’s in Daniel chapter 8. And yet these misunderstandings and these mis-taught interpretations of prophecy are happening in our times just as much if not more than it did back then. For those who are truly seeking to learn the truth and to delve deeper into Bible prophecy, these confusions and false teachings can do tremendous damage.

Alexander the Great comes to Jerusalem

Posted on December 5, 2013 by Mark McMillion

I’ve been able to complete the first of the supplementary videos to Daniel chapter 8, a seven minute video about Alexander the Great’s visit to Jerusalem which you can see below.

Gabriel tells Daniel of the coming Empire of Greece and Alexander, “the first king”.

This is just an amazing story and probably very few people know that this ever happened. Of course very few people know that the coming of Alexander the Great and the Grecian Empire were specifically revealed to the prophet Daniel by the angel Gabriel in Daniel chapter 8, 200 years before it happened. To me that’s one of the clearest and most emphatic prophetic fulfillments that you can find in history.

Alexander enters Jerusalem, 332 BC

But then it turns out that there is this historical account by one of the most well known and respected historians of ancient times, Flavius Josephus, which tells of Alexander actually coming to Jerusalem during his conquests of the Middle East in 332 BC. He was escorted into the city and shown the prophecy of Daniel about him from 200 years before. And to add to all this, Alexander told his own troops at that time that he’d seen, in a vision years before, the high priest of the Jews and a voice had told him that he should quickly move towards the Persians because he would be victorious.

To me, it’s just incredible. And it’s a shame that this has virtually never been made known to the millions who wonder and have an interest in prophetic things. Since this video is short, I won’t add much here. But I just hope you’ll view and enjoy this as one of the more amazing events in the history of prophecy.

The Daniel Chapter 8 video

Posted on September 6, 2013 by Mark McMillion

I’ve been able to complete a 29 minute video on Daniel chapter 8. You can click here to see the full version.

There is also a two minute clip of the video for those who’d like to have a preview.

This is the fourth in the series of videos I’ve been working on concerning Bible prophecy and the prophetic chapters in the book of Daniel. Like the other videos before this one, much of the video is filled with illustrations of Daniel, the angel Gabriel, “the ram and the goat”, Alexander the Great, and the Antichrist of the endtime. Much of this was partially fulfilled in ancient history. But it’s explained in the video how there are important parts that are yet to be fulfilled in the times leading up to the return of Jesus.

This chapter builds solidly on the previous revelations of Daniel chapter 7 where we saw the 4 beasts. But, in putting the video together, I was struck by how much this chapter lays the groundwork for what is revealed in perhaps the most important chapter, Daniel 9.

For example, perhaps the most difficult part of Daniel 8 is where, almost out of the blue, two angels are discussing “the sanctuary”, “the daily sacrifice” and “the transgression that makes desolate”. These are all totally new subjects to these visions and prophecies but they introduce key factors in the revelation of Daniel 9.

Understanding this information and seeing how it all fits is a challenge for those who are new to all this. In fact, we find that during this revelatory experience, Daniel himself evidently fainted twice. He said the vision disturbed him for days and that he didn’t himself understand it. So we can expect that it will not be all that easy to understand for those who are going over these things for the first time.

There’s much in this chapter about Greece and Alexander the Great. There is also key information about the Antichrist of the endtime. And we note that Gabriel specifically tells Daniel three times that the vision relates to “the end”. This is particularly important because some Bible teachers have tried to say that the most important parts of this chapter were already fulfilled in the century or two before the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem.

As I’ve done in the other videos, this class has been produced with the target audience being folks who are mostly new to the subject of Bible prophecy. There are English subtitles which will help those whose first language is not English.

I hope this video will be a blessing to you and yours. I’d be glad to hear any questions or comments on how these videos can be more of a help to you. You can reach me at mark@markmcmillion.com. God bless you, love you lots! Mark

He said it 3 times

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Mark McMillion

God doesn’t waste His breath. Like a good Father, He just expects that, if He says something, we’ll respond and do it.But on rare occasions, He said something three times. So, probably, whatever He said was important. One of those places is in Daniel chapter 8, the chapter I’m making the next video on currently. But let’s start off with what’s probably the most famous example of the Lord saying something three times.

After His resurrection, Jesus was with His disciples beside the Sea of Galilee. They’d just finished a fish supper that Jesus had prepared for them and it says in John 21:15-17, “So after they had dined, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?’ He said to Him, ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs’ . He said to him a second time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?’ He said to Him, ‘Yes, Lord, You know that I love You.’ He said to him, ‘Feed My sheep’. He said to him the third time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?’ Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’ And he said to Him, ‘Lord, You know all things. You know that I love You.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed My sheep’”.

That’s an amazing passage in Scripture. Jesus told Peter three times, “Feed My sheep.” It must have been that important to the Lord that He did something that emphatic and insistent. Feeding His sheep, teaching, instructing, nourishing and guiding the Lord’s sheep, His flock of believers is obviously just as important as it gets in God’s eyes.

And strangely, another time in the Bible it says that Peter was told something three times from God, in no uncertain terms. In Acts chapter 10 Peter was in Joppa in northern Israel. Peter was the head of the growing group of believers who spread Jesus’ message and truth, after He’d ascended to heaven years before. Peter was on a house top, in prayer, when in a vision he saw a sheet let down from heaven with all kinds of “unclean” animals. The Laws of Moses gave strict rules for the Jews as to what animals were “clean” to eat, permissible, and which ones weren’t.

So Peter sees this sheet coming down with these “unclean” animals and then he hears God’s voice, “Arise, Peter! Kill and eat!” Peter, being a righteous Jew replied, “Not so Lord, for I’ve never eaten anything that’s unclean.” And the voice said to him, “What God has cleansed, you do not call common.” (Acts 10:13-15)

It says, “This happened three times” (Acts 10:16) and then the sheet was let back up to heaven. It sounds like Peter was arguing with God but this seemed so contrary to everything Peter thought was righteous.Then it says that immediately there was a knock at the door downstairs at the house Peter was at. And the Lord told Peter that there were three men there who’d come to see him and that Peter should go with them, “doubting nothing”. (Acts 10:20)

“What’s the big deal with that?” you might say. The big deal is that these men at the door were Romans, “Gentiles”. The Jews weren’t supposed to have anything to do with Gentiles and certainly not go to their house. But Peter went, as the Lord had so firmly told him. The result? Peter preached to a big gathering of Gentiles, telling them about Jesus and they all experienced the infilling of the Holy Spirit, just as the first disciples had in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter 2.

Nowadays it’s easy for us to not appreciate all this. But it was a very, very big deal at that time. Basically this event was when the Lord opened the door clearly to non-Jews to receive all the blessing and provision of His promises, breaking down the wall between the Jews and the Gentiles, making it possibly for anyone through Jesus to receive salvation through Him. But God had to tell Peter plainly and emphatically, three times, that this was of Him and that Peter should go and flow with it, “doubting nothing.”

In Daniel chapter 8 something similar also happened. In a vision, Daniel was by the river Ulai, in what’s now modern Iran, and the angel Gabriel was commanded to explain what Daniel had just seen, a goat and a ram clashing in battle and the goat conquering the ram. But there was more to it, much more, and Daniel tells us he just didn’t understand it. But the angel Gabriel then tells Daniel three times in two verses that “at the time of the end shall be the vision”. (Daniel 8:17-19)

Daniel chapter 8 is a somewhat difficult chapter to understand or even to teach. Prophecy teachers through the years have had some huge debates about parts of it and I’ve been in some of those debates. Some say that it’s all already been fulfilled. But then we can go back to the words of Gabriel, spoken three times to Daniel, “at the time of the end shall be the vision.” At the time of the end. And we’re not there yet. But we may be getting real close.

[Since completing this blog post, I’ve also completed the full video on Daniel chapter 8. That video in English can be seen here.]

When God says something three times, it’s important. Whether it’s to feed the flock of God, or to not call unclean what God has cleansed, or that the prophecies of God are going to have a future, endtime fulfillment, God thought those were important enough to say it three times. Lord help us to get the point , to believe it and act upon it.

Mark McMillion

Creeds and Deeds, Facts and Acts

Category Archives: The Daniel videos and texts